Saturday, Aug. 29. Four Californians—a girl, her father, mother, and lover, all well clad and good-looking—presented themselves before me to-day. The old man said he had come to reclaim his daughter, who had run away with the young Mexican,—that he had no objection to his marrying her, but this running away with her didn’t look decent. The rash lover stated in his defence that he was ready to marry her, had run away with her for that purpose, had placed her immediately with his sister, and that she was still as chaste and pure as the driven snow. To all this the father and mother assented.
I now expected we should have a wedding at once, and that I might be called upon to officiate. But to my utter surprise, on asking the girl if she insisted on marrying her lover, she declined. She said her escape with him was a wild freak; she had now got over it, and wished to return with her father. This fell like a death-knell on the ears of her lover, who again protested his affection and her purity. Having been once myself a disappointed suitor, I had a fellow feeling for him, and advised the girl to marry him; but she said no, that she had changed her mind: so I delivered her to her father, and told my brother in misfortune he must wait; that a woman who had changed her mind once on such a subject, would change it again.
Sunday, Aug. 30. Several gentlemen and ladies of Monterey were present to-day at our service on board the Savannah. I have it in contemplation to establish a service on shore. There are plenty of halls, which are now used for dancing, and I should have as little scruple in converting one of them into a church, as Father Whitfield had in appropriating to his use the popular airs of the day, when he said he had no notion of letting the devil run away with all the fine tunes. Blessings on the memory of that devoted missionary! He has embalmed in his church melodies that will live when the profane lyres from which they flowed have long since been silent.
The wild Indians here have a vague belief in the soul’s immortality. They say, “as the moon dieth and cometh to life again, so man, though he die, will again live.” But their future state is material; the wicked are to be bitten by serpents, scorched by lightning, and plunged down cataracts; while the good are to hunt their game with bows that never lose their vigor, with arrows that never miss their aim, and in forests where the crystal streams roll over golden sands. Immortal youth is to be the portion of each; and age, and pain, and death, are to be known no more.
Monday, Aug. 31. I am at last forced into a systematic arrangement of my time; without it, I could never get through with my duties. I rise with the sun, read till eight o’clock, and then breakfast, at nine, enter on my duties as alcalde, which confine me till three, P. M., then dine; and at four take my gun and plunge into the woods for exercise and partridges; return at sunset, take tea, and in the evening write up my journal, and an editorial for the Californian.
When the Sabbath comes, I preach; my sermons are composed in the woods, in the court-room, or in bed, just where I can snatch a half hour. I often plan them while some plaintiff is spinning a long yarn about things and matters in general, or some defendant is losing himself in a labyrinth of apologetic circumstances. By this forbearance both are greatly relieved; one disburdens himself of his grievances, the other lightens his guilt, and, in the mean time, my sermon develops itself into a more tangible arrangement. My text might often be—“And he fell among thieves.”
Tuesday, Sept. 1. It is singular how the Californians reckon distances. They will speak of a place as only a short gallop off, when it is fifty or a hundred miles distant. They think nothing of riding a hundred and forty miles in a day, and breaking down three or four horses in doing it, and following this up by the week. They subsist almost exclusively on meat, and when travelling, sleep under the open sky. They drive their ox-carts, loaded with lumber or provisions, two hundred miles to market. Their conceptions seem to annihilate space.
Wednesday, Sept. 2. The officers of Gen. Castro have been permitted to return to their homes, after having taken an oath that they will not, on pain of death, be found in arms against the United States during the existence of the present war. A few, perhaps from national pride, refused at first the oath, but were compelled to take it, or be treated as prisoners of war. They of course preferred the former. The ladies don’t seem to care much about these nice points in military etiquette: they want their husbands at home; and their return, though on parole, is the signal for getting up a ball. A Californian would hardly pause in a dance for an earthquake, and would be pretty sure to renew it, even before its vibrations had ceased. At a wedding they dance for three days and nights, during which time the new-married couple are kept on their feet. No compassion is shown them, as they have so much bliss in reserve.
Thursday, Sept. 3. Dispatches were received this morning, by courier, from Com. Stockton, dated at the Pueblo de los Angeles. They contain his second address to the people of California, which defines the new attitude in which the country is placed by the declaration of war between the United States and Mexico. The address is humane in its tone, expansive and vigorous in its spirit. It has had the salutary effect to set the community at rest, by establishing in the minds of the wavering the full conviction that California is henceforth a part of the United States. Ex-Gov. Pio Pico, it seems, did not escape with Gen. Castro, but has surrendered to the commodore. He is one of the few who commanded the confidence and respect of the public.
Friday, Sept. 4. I empannelled to-day the first jury ever summoned in California. The plaintiff and defendant are among the principal citizens of the country. The case was one involving property on the one side, and integrity of character on the other. Its merits had been pretty widely discussed, and had called forth an unusual interest. One-third of the jury were Mexicans, one-third Californians, and the other third Americans. This mixture may have the better answered the ends of justice, but I was apprehensive at one time it would embarrass the proceedings; for the plaintiff spoke in English, the defendant in French, the jury, save the Americans, Spanish, and the witnesses all the languages known to California. But through the silent attention which prevailed, the tact of Mr. Hartnell, who acted as interpreter, and the absence of young lawyers, we got along very well.